An increase in tram fares would enable the operator to put wages up to find and keep hold of talent, a union chief said on Thursday.

Hong Kong Tramways is hoping to get the go-ahead to increase adult fares from HK$3 to HK$3.30, child fares from HK$1.50 to HK$1.60 and fares for the over 65s from HK$1.30 to HK$1.50.

The company says passenger figures are still about 15 percent down on 2018, before the protests and Covid pandemic.

The chairman of the Hong Kong Tramway Workers Union, Yeh Yung-sheng, said fare increases would help the company attract new workers, some of whom would need to learn specialist skills.

"The whole of the tram's chassis is made by hand. It's not built from parts that are bought from the market... So we need to pass on such techniques," he told RTHK.

"You cannot just find any workers who can do such work, and it takes time for us to train such workers. [So] if the pay is not good enough, then they might feel that they do not want to learn such techniques."

But speaking on the same RTHK programme, lawmaker Chan Hok-fung, who is a member of Legco's transport panel, said Hong Kong Tramways will lose even more passengers if fares go up.

"At present, with the existing prices, trams do not have the so-called competitive advantage. And if you raise the fares further, the gap between the fares of trams and those of buses will be further narrowed, and then even more passenger traffic will be lost," he said.

"The advantage of trams in the past was not their speed, but their prices, because it was cost-effective, but if they do not even have that advantage, their original passengers will be lost."

Chan said the company could instead take steps to boost passenger numbers, for example by introducing Pokémon or panda-themed trams.

Hong Kong Tramways says the proposed fare increases would mainly be spent on renovating its fleet and expanding non-ticket revenue projects.